What does it mean to be Spiritual but not religious?

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Diana_P Post #21 May 23,2011, 6:06pm

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AZJoe wrote :

Christ did in fact warn "lip service" Christians that they would be rejected. Christ tells us that one is judged by what they DID (or didn't do but should have) and for what they knew to be true - not by what they believed or even professed (Matthew 25:31-46).

We are still left with the question why do some believe and others don’t?

Is it really a matter of choice?

If two intelligent reasonable people are presented with the same evidence what makes one lean toward faith and the other away?

Is it something tangible? Could it really be simply a misunderstanding of the text, doctrine, or the messenger?

Is it something intangible? Could it be the Holly Spirit? Could it be that salvation for this particular individual was not a part of God’s plan?

As a Christian I have to wonder why any informed person would deliberately and knowingly refuse salvation. What is it they see that Christians can’t? Or is it that Christians simply “feel” something that non-believers don’t.

Is either side truly responding purely with reason? It seems that both conclusions are being passionately exerted. Why? We are born neither Christian nor atheist. What makes a person identify with a certain viewpoint? How did Christianity or atheism go from being “a belief” to “your belief” and something that you nurture and defend as if you created it yourself?

Perhaps we will never know the answer to that question.

AudioDad Post #22 May 23,2011, 7:30pm

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Diana_P wrote :

Or is it a lack of actual study about world religions and how each successive religion borrowed from the doctrines of those that came before. Right down the line, you can see the central tenets of the current Abrahamic religions being lifted from religions that long predated them....the virgin birth, substitutionary forgiveness, world wide floods, creation mythology, divinity of the central messiah figure, etc, etc, etc. None of it originated with Judaism or Christianity. Substituting the "holy" days of the new religion to de-emphasize the celebrations of the old religions - Christmas, Easter, etc.- and how the gods of the old religions became the demons of the new.

Or how the books in what became known as the Protestant Bible actually got in there. (hint: it had nothing to do with divine guidance and everything to do with consolidating power in the hands of priests and emperors). We have Constantine to thank for initially deciding what was canonical and what wasn't, and Theodossius for making the un-canonical material heretical. Many believers will spout chapter and verse at you all day long and have not the slightest clue about how it actually got into the Bible. Of course, they'll tell you with all-knowing certainty that those redactions and manipulations were all guided by the hand of God. How do they know that? Because the Bible says so. But of course it does!

Some are simply content to use the Bible to prove it, and their belief in it, are true. That kind of circular reasoning is all too common and fails to acknowledge the history of how this particular religion came to be. Indeed, many are utterly ignorant of the history of their own faith and simply believe because it's what they grew up with. Quite a number of us atheists were in fact devout Christians but through years of soul searching and study have arrived at a very different conclusion than you have.

Diana_P wrote :

Is it something intangible? Could it be the Holly Spirit? Could it be that salvation for this particular individual was not a part of God’s plan?

As a Christian I have to wonder why any informed person would deliberately and knowingly refuse salvation. What is it they see that Christians can’t? Or is it that Christians simply “feel” something that non-believers don’t.

It's because we've come to the understanding that "salvation" is religion's offer to solve a problem of its own making. And also that the Christian version of salvation is nothing more than the latest version of a long history of messiah's who promised their followers everlasting happiness if they just do as they're told. That's the hook....it plays to our fear of the unknown and our own guilt. Those two things are extremely powerful motivators and will make people do and believe in all kinds of things. Those who learned that early on in human evolution learned how to manipulate others and it continues to this day.

Diana_P wrote :

We are born neither Christian nor atheist. What makes a person identify with a certain viewpoint? How did Christianity or atheism go from being “a belief” to “your belief” and something that you nurture and defend as if you created it yourself?

Perhaps we will never know the answer to that question.

I think the answer to this lies in the corruption of the word "atheist" by god believers over the centuries. Literally, it means without theism or, simply, lack of belief in the notion that there is one god as the creator and ruler of the universe as evinced by divine revelation. Note that this doesn't automatically mean a non-belief in some kind of existence beyond the one we currently occupy. So, in terms of the clinical definition of atheism, yes, we are in fact all born atheists. Religion, regardless of the flavor, is something we're indoctrinated with after we're born. The term can also be applied to believers of any stripe. Christians are atheists about Brahma, Vishnu, Osiris, Set, etc. Those of us who call ourselves atheists just believe in one less god than you do.

AZJoe Post #23 May 23,2011, 7:40pm

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Diana_P wrote :

We are still left with the question why do some believe and others don’t?

Why? It is hubris - simple pride. It is exceedingly dangerous and corrupts and spiritually blinds the soul. It blunts knowledge and intellect and makes a soul ignore the truth to fancy itself its own creature that is endowed with its own organic self-sufficiency.

Lucifer was the highest angelic being ever created - pure intellect, stately bearing and power bestowed by God for service to Him. Lucifer fell and became Satan not for lack of insight. His Non serviam ("I will not serve") was a conscious choice made with the foreknowledge of consequence. The saints tell us through various private revelation that Lucifer discerned God's plan to incarnate in human form to become "flesh" so as to elevate humanity's nature. This was repugnant to Lucifer since it meant He must serve God in a corporeal estate that was beneath His own creature race and nature. Compare and contrast that to the meek and humble Mary ("handmaiden of The Lord") who was chosen above all other creatures to be God's earthly arc and mother. We see in scripture that God always favors the meek and the humble and tears down the proud and the boastful. There is something about pride that corrupts intellect, reason and deceives the soul to turn it against God. Ever since his fall Satan has been trying to use the same core sin of pride to sway man to choose him over God. Thus Adam & Eve fell seeking equality with God at Satan's tempting. Hubris is like serpents venom.

So those who refuse to listen are most often distracted and spiritually blinded either by earthly concerns and pursuits (sensual impulses) or by hubris and confidence in own self sufficiency.

No one gains heaven without loving God in the fullest sense of authentic love -- for His own goodness sake (and NOT just for reward or "works" nor out of fear of Him for His just punishments). It is only the most stubborn of heart and those who hate God and His people who will not respond to God's call. God gives all souls access to grace sufficient to gain salvation without prejudice to His omniscient foreknowledge of how a particular soul will choose (for or against). He will not force or bully a soul to love Him by awing it with amazing signs and wonders (that violates a justice principal). But He gives each soul what it chooses - either to be alone by itself to suffer its choice forever in separation from God or to be with Him and the rest of God's heavenly family for all eternity..

AZJoe Post #24 May 24,2011, 4:20am

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AudioDad wrote :

Anything can be attacked using fallacy.

This is getting into debate about the basis of Christianity. We probably should start a new topic discussion so to not clutter this topic. I will respond to some of your comments though.

I have to smile and sigh here – your entire unbelief is based on fallacy. You have apparently been "educated" (or "indoctrinated") by fellow atheists who have successfully recruited a new disciple through the waterboard of old and utterly debunked: speculations, conjectures, paranoia and suspicions. Apply the common-sense test. Do YOU really believe that some Jewish fishermen who could not read or write and who went to their deaths for their beliefs (for no personal gain) sat down at the advent of a new civilization to conspire a new grand multi-generational myth based on the study of their enemies religions? Do you think these men went toe-to-toe against the cruel Romans by refusing to worship their false gods and risk torture and death for a new fable when they had nothing to gain personally? Liars have no scruples and would do the exact opposite under persecution – sell out their fellows for gold or privilege. Yet the only one who did was named Judas – and he hung himself out of regret and grief.

If you think all this, do YOU really think that they could have kept the big lie going for millennia and have no one "in the know" cave-in all that time to rat out their fellows in exchange for a new priesthood or kingly court position (and riches and women etc.). Why not offer up yet a new religion when persecuted that has an even greater god and religion more powerful than the last version? Perhaps some tried but could not deliver on the miracles (raising people from the dead, multiplying loaves, walking on water etc.). Sounds like a very silly and utterly improbable sequence of events to me. Did you say something about fairy tales?

You or your instructors have been apparently reading too much fiction of the genre that author Dan Brown writes (and openly sells as fiction). Or you have read defective "scholarly" works like Sir James G. Frazer's The Golden Bough, an influential study in comparative folklore, magic, and religion and let these sources feed into your general proclivity for mistrust and suspicion. Let me say for the record that there's nothing wrong with healthy inquiry and critical analysis – Christians welcome this since we know that our faith is rational and must boldly stand up to scrutiny . And so it has – for 2,000 years we have educated pagan countries, originated the university systems we have today, built civilizations and even taught our detractors and skeptics how to read and write (loving one's enemies). But "the gates of hell" be it the pig-iron of contempt, or the worm-wood of pure ignorance or the paper-thin pulp of revisionists history have not prevailed (as promised) and never will.

I don't have the time or space here to do a complete a corrective thesis for you. But here are just a few general facts that thoroughly debunk all that you say:

There is little or no evidence that most pagan mystery religions such as the Egyptian cult of Isis and Osiris or the cult of Mithras existed prior to the mid-first century in the forms described inThe Da Vinci CodeorHoly Blood, Holy Grail. and other pop culture books.

Far too many writers/detractors (with an anti-Christian agenda) use late source material (after A.D. 200) to form reconstructions of the third-century mystery experience and then uncritically reason back to what they think must have been the earlier nature of the cults. Ronald Nash, E. O. James, Bruce Metzger, Günter Wagner, Hugo Rahner, and others have pointed out that the pagan mystery religions were quite different from Christianity in significant ways. Google them and research if you have not yet committed your life to the false basis you now embrace as "truth".

There is a sharp contrast between the mythological character of pagan mystery religions and the historical character of the Gospels and the New Testament writings. In his studyHistorical and Literary Studies: Pagan, Jewish, and Christian, Bruce Metzger writes:

Unlike the deities of the mysteries, who were nebulous figures of an imaginary past, the divine being whom the Christian worshiped as Lord was known as a real person on earth only a short time before the earliest documents of the New Testament were written. From the earliest times the Christian creed included the affirmation that Jesus "was crucified under Pontius Pilate." On the other hand, Plutarch thinks it necessary to warn the priestess Clea against believing that "any of these tales [concerning Isis and Osiris] actually happened in the manner in which they are related."
Here's an interesting link you might want to review: Is Christianity Pagan?

There are ample historical evidence from enemies of Christianity who certainly had no motive to advance Christian "myths" who attest and record to the real existence of a man "Jesus" (notably Josephus – Jewish-Roman Historian). Grand scale rapid changes in civilization such as we see at the advent of Christianity are unfounded in all of recorded history. None of this forensic or historical evidence exists for any of the pagan gods ever being a real person or entity. None before had such integrated prophecy fulfillment developed over millenia from Jewish prophets coming from competing and often non-cooperating tribes (blows the conspiracy theory). Christianity is singularly unique in all of history – there is no other religion even comparative to its core principals -- especially "loving your enemy". This is not the fingerprint of a religion of human origin.

If you can be more specific and have the time, I can debunk each and every of the popular "atheist" conjectures about pagan religions being a prototype for Christianity. But I'd recommend just asking yourself the obvious and going out to investigate further: "Do you really think that a conspiracy could have survived the level of brutal persecution it did if it was a fabrication (400 years initially – and again restarting now in modern times too)? Do you really think 11 million early Christians would peacefully let them selves be martyred and not fight back if they did not have profound faith in the gospel accounts as being credible and true?

My advice: My friend, don't bet your life and your eternity on skepticism, fallacy nor the gloomy hope of eternal oblivion.

Last edited by AZJoe; May 24,2011 at 4:28am.

AZJoe Post #25 May 24,2011, 7:14am

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AudioDad wrote :

...Or how the books in what became known as the Protestant Bible actually got in there. (hint: it had nothing to do with divine guidance and everything to do with consolidating power in the hands of priests and emperors). We have Constantine to thank for initially deciding what was canonical and what wasn't, and Theodossius for making the un-canonical material heretical. Many believers will spout chapter and verse at you all day long and have not the slightest clue about how it actually got into the Bible. Of course, they'll tell you with all-knowing certainty that those redactions and manipulations were all guided by the hand of God. How do they know that? Because the Bible says so. But of course it does!

Nice attempt to add a jaded view of revisionist history and to editorialize. You can't back up what you say with historical evidence.

Constantine's Edict of Milan in 313 officially ended state persecution of Christians and opened up Religious Tolerance. Are you wanting to undo tolerance here?

Constantine as a convert to Christianity was a friend of the Church (for the most part) but did not have authority to change the faith he converted to. That's a silly hypothesis to think he would convert to something he didn't believe in then try to change it. The Church had already a wide collection of circulating texts that become the bible well before his time. The bible was canonized at the direction of Pope Damasus in 382 AD now that conditions were favorable to calling many conferences without fear of persecution.

BTW, some of us uneducated and ignorant Christians have spent years of our own time looking into these topics and do know exactly how the Protestant Bible actually got there. But why did you focus on a bible version that was developed 1500 years after the advent of Christianity rather than on the original Catholic Latin Vulgate from which all current bibles derive their canonical table of contents from? Peculiar.

A bit of history:

Immediately after Pentecost (the accounts of when the Holy Spirit appeared as tongues of fire shortly after the resurrection) the apostles set out to preach all over the known world by word of mouth (and example) as instructed by Christ. At first nothing was written down since they and the first Christians all assumed initially that Christ's return was imminent in their life times (a wrong human assumption as Christ never said this). To them, time was of the essence to just get "the good news" out to as many as they could and as fast as possible. NO BIBLE existed for about 350 years in the fledgling new Christian Church.

After some of the apostles and their disciples started getting persecuted and martyred and after competing cults like the Gnostics tried to opportunistically hijack their fledgling new religion the apostles then started to write some things down to keep order and reduce confusion. They wanted a single universal and authoritative orthodox teaching and faith (BTW Greek "katholikos" – "regarding the whole," or, more simply, "universal" where the word "Catholic" derives) common to all Christians. Copies were made of some of these original letters and instructions and were circulated among the churches – but these were only a few of the current 26 NT gospel texts we currently have. There were other retained books too – considered practical disciplines rather than inspired texts (e.g. the Didache now believed to be one of the earliest written – 40 AD or so).

It took all of the first century for the last apostle to write their texts (John's Revelation in 90AD). Other texts were developed from direct disciples of the apostles (Luke, Mark, Hebrews etc.) and circulated. St. Paul, previously a Jewish rabbi and scholar who persecuted Christians converted after a profound supernatural episode. He was instrumental in pulling together the Old Testament prophecies and developing the framework for the theology we now have today. He was a very prolific writer and so we have most all of his original works (we also know a few of his texts are lost to us).

During the 2nd century false texts originated by individuals set on glomming onto the rapidly growing Christian movement and for personal gain started competing with the apostles teachings. Again, there was as of yet no "bible" – just various collections of copies of a few apostolic writings in circulation. Few churches had full sets of writings and none of them save the original 4 gospels were really agreed on in common. The "Vetus Latina" ("Old Latin") was a collection of old Latin translated writings that really become the nucleus of what does become the bible. It was not until 382 AD when Pope Damasus I commissioned renowned Christian scholar (St.) Jerome to bring all the know writings together, discern and recommend which were most trusted sources and retranslate from the various sources (Hebrew, Latin & Greek) into current Latin. There were a few texts that there was some disagreement about and so Pope Damasus called for a special conference (Council of Rome 382) to resolve the disputes. From that council we got the current canon of texts (the official table of contents) and original Latin translation we today call "The Bible". It is called The Vulgate and still highly esteemed and used (but few speak that old Latin dialect anymore). This bible cannon was further ratified with all the known Christian church's bishops in the know world in subsequent council meetings (Council of Rome (382AD), Council of Hippo (393AD), Council of Carthage (397), Pope Innocent I, Bishop of Rome, 401-417 (405). This was what was predominantly preached and taught in every church calling itself Christian through the 16th century - the time when the Protestant leaders revolted and were excommunicated for inciting and spreading new teaching heresies.

Thus, The Bible Canon itself was unchallenged for over 1,000 years until the Protestant revolt. Originally Luther wanted to remove 5 NT texts that refuted his new reformed theories. But his supporters, ex-Catholics thought that too radical a departure that would fragment the new cult. So he deferred to keep the Catholic NT cannon intact and elected to "preach" around the words with his own ideas. The only thing that was removed were the Old Testament Deuteroconical books – things that ran counter to his ideas.

The Council of Trent, an ecumenical council called to respond to the heresy of the Reformers (1545-1563) reaffirmed the original cannon held by Christians up through that day.

Since the time of the Protestant revolution the original Protestant movement has now splintered into 37.000 separate Protestant world wide denominations. There are now scores of revisions to the original bible – favoring ever new translations to remove "Catholic words" and focus and amplify more of their own framework of beliefs. Yet ALL of these revised bibles (to my knowledge) still RETAIN the entire New Testament Canon as originally developed by Catholic Pope Damasus in 382 AD. They used to retain most all the Old Testament books at least for reference at the back of the bible (the Deuteroconocal books) ). What is interesting to note is that the King James version (developed by a committee of competing Protestant sects and overseen by King James to prevent factions from revolting in England) originally retained the full set of Catholic OT books as reference. But printers and publishers later decided all on their own to remove the Deuteroconocal references to save on printing and shipping costs.

Your real beef is not apparently with the books of the Bible or their pedigree but with the fact that there are a lot of self-righteous people blindly hiding behind texts who's histories they know little about and who don't have a clue about what they are reading with respect to historical fact and what was actually taught in apostolic times in the early church. That's a legitimate complaint that I can share with you.

Last edited by AZJoe; May 24,2011 at 7:33am.

AudioDad Post #26 May 24,2011, 8:56am

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AZJoe wrote :

Anything can be attacked using fallacy.

Indeed it can. It is also true that anything can be supported by using fallacy.

AZJoe wrote :

I have to smile and sigh here – your entire unbelief is based on fallacy. You have apparently been "educated" (or "indoctrinated") by fellow atheists who have successfully recruited a new disciple through the waterboard of old and utterly debunked: speculations, conjectures, paranoia and suspicions.

You assume much, but know very little. Having spent the first 25 years of my life as a Bible believing, evangelical Christian, I'm quite well versed in the rationalizations and tactics used by that crowd to "debunk" findings that cast doubt on their faith. Far from being "instructed" by "fellow atheists", I arrived at my present world view through 25 years of reading, learning and studying on my own. It didn't happen overnight nor was it a process of indoctrination. I undertook this because, originally, I had an intense desire to understand more fully the history of my faith and what it was I truly believed in.

AZJoe wrote :

Again with the instructors bit. You know what they say about assuming.

While I certainly enjoy Brown's novels, I read them for what they are - fiction. Frazer? My friend, where have you been? Yes, I've read Frazer's work and a number of critiques of it - interesting to note that most of the critiques were based on the abridged work and not the full breadth of Frazer's work. Nonetheless, archaeology and the study of comparative world religions has advanced light years since the late 19th century.

AZJoe wrote :

There is little or no evidence that *I will acknowledge* that most pagan mystery religions such as the Egyptian cult of Isis and Osiris or the cult of Mithras existed prior to the mid-first century in the forms described inThe Da Vinci CodeorHoly Blood, Holy Grail. and other pop culture books.

There, fixed it for you.

AZJoe wrote :

Far too many writers/detractors (with an anti-Christian agenda) use late source material (after A.D. 200) to form reconstructions of the third-century mystery experience and then uncritically reason back to what they think must have been the earlier nature of the cults. Ronald Nash, E. O. James, Bruce Metzger, Günter Wagner, Hugo Rahner, and others have pointed out that the pagan mystery religions were quite different from Christianity...

Currentl scholarship on this topic is based on sources far older than 200 A.D. You might try reading up on findings of the Ashurbanipal library for example. Metzger was a firm believer in the resurrection of Christ and held to the notion of infallibility. His textual critiscims of the NT were certainly interesting, but he can hardly be held up as an objective source on this topic. Nash, another Christian apologist, consistently argues for the Christian exclusivism and pretty much rejects out of hand anything that goes against that view. Wagner essentially takes the same approach as Nash. James and Rahner I'm not familiar with but will google them up. However, if they're anything like the other three, one can hardly hold them up as objective. These are people who start from a pre-determined conclusion and either reject contrary evidence out of hand or twist it to support that conclusion. Most of the work attempting to disassociate the mystery cults from Christianity is decades old. You might consider reading up on more contemporary work.

This is getting far beyond the topic of the OP and I agree this material really should be addressed in a separate thread. As for people believing so strongly in their worldview that they died for it, that's hardly a convincing argument for the truth of those beliefs. Lots of people believed the world was flat. That didn't make it true. Lots of people the world over believed the sun orbited the Earth and oppressed, tortured and even killed those that advanced the heliocentric view. That didn't make them right either. The Heaven's Gate followers believed so strongly in their version of the "truth" that they all killed themselves to hitch a ride on the passing alien spacecraft. The Crusades and various other pogroms were all undertaken by people who fervently believed in the things they did. That didn't make them, their world view, or their actions, right.

Last edited by AudioDad; May 24,2011 at 8:58am.

llw11 Post #27 May 24,2011, 4:15pm

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Diana_P wrote :

We are still left with the question why do some believe and others don’t?

Is it really a matter of choice?

the question should be whether or not we actually control what we believe. christians can convince themselves of this all they want but you simply can't.

you can go on 10 dates with 10 people but you don't control who you connect with. belief works the same way. we can go to church and pretend we believe and suppress our logical/rational mind all we want but what is REALLY in our heart is beyond our control. for YEARS, i really wanted to enjoy going to church and learning about christianity and serving God. for YEARS and asked God for inspiration but for whatever reason, my rational mind took over and i just couldn't do it.

AZJoe Post #28 May 25,2011, 6:37am

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llw11 wrote :

the question should be whether or not we actually control what we believe. christians can convince themselves of this all they want but you simply can't.

you can go on 10 dates with 10 people but you don't control who you connect with. belief works the same way. we can go to church and pretend we believe and suppress our logical/rational mind all we want but what is REALLY in our heart is beyond our control. for YEARS, i really wanted to enjoy going to church and learning about Christianity and serving God. for YEARS and asked God for inspiration but for whatever reason, my rational mind took over and i just couldn't do it.

Rut ro... God must be up to His sneaky old mind-control tricks again. I suddenly can't believe a word you say.

On other matters, certainly chemistry is nearly impossible to discern over the internet but it was YOUR choice (and the others choice) to seek a mate through the service and to not close or close an opportunity.

Sorry to hear you apparently were in a bad church environment or in a "seeking" spiritual state that was not yet endowed with a firm conviction of faith . Many people wrongly equate "feeling" (sensual impulses and emotions) with their spiritual health. This is very unreliable however and without proper spiritual advice can certainly lead to discouragement and falling away. Mother Theresa of world renown faith and service to the poor of India admitted that she went through a protracted period of spiritual crisis we call Dark Night of The Soul that spanned the last half-century of her life. She said that she felt no presence of God whatsoever in her life (a very empty and disturbing feeling and severe test of faith for any saintly person who has experienced God before). Yet, in that protracted time she continued her life mission to feed and care for the destitute children of India. Because of her spiritual training though she knew of this sort of phenomena and trusted that God was teaching her something very important that would spiritually benefit her tremendously in eternity. Never give up and trust in God. Reexamine your motives for wanting to come into the faith fully. Recall from scripture that Simon The Magician tried to become Christian to get "the magic" for doing the tricks and for impressing the crowds (and making money). He was dismissed from the Church for insincerity and denied any part of the faith.

Many people go to church for all the wrong reasons. Some that I have seen are::

Wanting to hear essentially a "motivational" speaker make them feel good
Social & business networking
Entertainment

The proper motive is to come together as a Christian community to worship God and to draw close to Him as a family. He gives graces and insights and matures the spirit as one advances in their faith. It's whole life long progression.

Hope it can all work out for you

Last edited by AZJoe; May 25,2011 at 6:41am.

hermes01 Post #29 May 25,2011, 7:26am

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Why some believe and some not?.....................Could FEAR play a part in all this?

AZJoe Post #30 May 25,2011, 7:30am

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AudioDad wrote :

This is getting far beyond the topic of the OP and I agree this material really should be addressed in a separate thread. As for people believing so strongly in their worldview that they died for it, that's hardly a convincing argument for the truth of those beliefs. Lots of people believed the world was flat. That didn't make it true. Lots of people the world over believed the sun orbited the Earth and oppressed, tortured and even killed those that advanced the heliocentric view. That didn't make them right either. The Heaven's Gate followers believed so strongly in their version of the "truth" that they all killed themselves to hitch a ride on the passing alien spacecraft. The Crusades and various other pogroms were all undertaken by people who fervently believed in the things they did. That didn't make them, their world view, or their actions, right.

Yeah, it is. I am enjoying the dialog however. I do want to just point out a few more fallacies in assumption and errors in historical perspective here for record...
1) I don't know of anyone who died defending their belief in a flat earth.
2) Suicide by the mentally ill and torture and execution of the rationally minded and innocent are as different as darkness is to light.
3)Describing the Crusades as a pogoram departs completely from historical fact and illustrates a severely deficient world view. The Crusades were a response to Islamic invasion of Christian lands and nations. Read some history to see how close Europe came to being over run by the Islamics. If they had not fought back all of Christendom would have been plundered and force converted to Islam or enslaved just as they did in N. Africa (ironically where the slave trade came from that supplied slaves to America).
4) The heliocentric view. was developed by Galileo (a Catholic Christian) at the commission of the Pope to develop a more accurate calendar for liturgical purposes. Contrary to popular myth the Church never harmed him and actually protected him from the citizen mobs (by house arrest) and the harsh secular courts of the King.. The Church has never persecuted anyone for scientific discovery, rather it only censured or branded "heretical" those few scientists who tried to develop and teach new theology to account for their scientific discoveries (e.g. mixing science and religion). Its invalid and disingenuous to subscribe misdeeds of individual citizens calling themselves Christians or even government officials against others when the church never sanctioned any such actions.
5) Your notion of "right" can't ever be entirely rational (repeatable and consistent) without a moral standard nor while possessing such a biased perspective that departs so radically from historical fact and real conditions.

What should be an even more convincing argument however is the durability of the Christian Faith in the face of endless assault and persecution. Christianity has simply outlived all its enemies and seen entire empires and nations come and go for 2 thousand years now. - all while continuing to peacefully expand. That is not itself conclusive proof of course but it should lend reasonable credibility for skeptics to go do some personal investigation. At least to your credit you have done a lot of personal investigation. Don't be surprised if you find out that God is not at all done with you yet and is letting you sharpen your blade so to speak as an atheist to better learn how atheists think and reason so that He can pull you back in the future and use you as a every effective apologist to win over some hardened atheist converts.

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Topic • Category	Views	Posts
Ending a friendship • Relationships	0	5
War of the Directors • Game Group	0	180
How much does race play in your dating someone? • Dating	0	37
Favorite Card Game • Chit Chat	0	11
Robin Gibbs Dead at 62...How Deep is Your Love? • Chit Chat	0	37
Photo Review • Profile Review Requests	0	17
Can I wait and move on at the same time? • Ask a Dating Expert	0	22
Where is Becky?!? • Chit Chat	0	62
53343 more topics in our discussion boards. Join the conversation!

“ Excellent, thank you. I think I will leave out the first part, I think it is unnecessary information to give him. I'm not interested in putting myself out there like that and it might be a little ... ” – generallyyou

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“Alfred Hitchcock - 18 Steven Spielberg - 62 *notice what?” – dmi

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“ I would be "certain people" :P The issue isn't a deal-breaker, but a very strong factor preference-wise, for me.” – ThePriestess

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“Love Texas Hold'em!.. I'm thinking of trying another tournament this summer...not sure yet though.. Never entered a tournament before, outside of online ones. Personally I prefer to play with ... ” – Freezepop

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“Make that 3! I also had a crush on Donny Osmond. I think I still have a record or two of his. Suzie ” – legend29

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“Oh, my revised profile can be seen in the forum in the section where you can ask for a profile review. Suzanne” – SuzanneScorpio

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“Just remember, everything that you are feeling and/or are capable of he is as well. If he wanted to reach you, he could. Right now he knows that you are hurting, and that this is not what you ... ” – lynntlb78

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“ Yohio. And the shortened form (Anya) is nice too.” – ThePriestess

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